The Notre Dame College Falcons and Lynn University Fighting Knights battled each other in day two of the Florida Tech Winter Classic at the Charles and Ruth Clemente Center Monday. Ultimately it was the top defense in the Sunshine State Conference when it comes to points allowed per game that prevailed 68-63 against a Falcons team that came into this Florida trip leading the MEC in 3-point percentage but could not find that stoke in the two days of the Winter Classic on the Florida Tech campus. NDC fell to 8-4 on the year with the loss, while Lynn improved to 7-3 after the win.
NDC would score the game first five points as Daylin Lee hit a jumper and Tyland Crawford would knock down a 3-pointer. The next five points went to Lynn but Jaedon Willis put the Falcons back on top. With a Willis jumper at the 10:55 mark of the opening stanza it was a 16-15 lead for the Falcons. The lead was 21-20 in favor of the Falcons as DeAirius Barker split a pair of free throws. After a Willis 3-pointer at the 4:14 mark of the first stanza the game was again knotted at 26. The two teams would stay on the seesaw until a Willis jumper and a pair of Willis free throws gave NDC a 34-30 halftime lead. Willis led NDC with 16 points in the first stanza. The Falcons shot 42 percent from the field in the stanza while they shot 25 percent (3-12) from the 3-point line. NDC shot at a 50 percent clip (3-6) from the free throw line.
Lynn shot 39 percent as a team, 39 percent (5-13) from the 3-point line, and 50 percent (1-2) from the free throw line in the first half.
After a three point play by Lee NDC stretched the lead back to seven (37-30) to start the second half. After a Lee 3-pointer at the 16 minute mark NDC had a eight point cushion (42-34.) The Fighting Knights would fight back and tie the game at 50 on a Brandon Bornelus 3-pointer with just under eight minutes to go. Lynn would take a five point lead (57-52) as Christina Peevy took control of the game late. Willis hit a pair of free throws at the 3:27 mark to trim the Lynn lead to three (60-57.) Cameron Gaines had a cutback dunk at the 2:28 mark that made it 62-57 Lynn. Willis would make one last scoring run when it was 66-58 Fighting Knights as he hit a pair of free throws and a 3-pointer to make it 66-63 with 25 ticks left on the clock. Peevy would ice it for the Fighting Knights at the free throw line.
NDC was led by 23 points from Willis, while Lee netted 14. Mike Sampson added eight points and seven rebounds as well. The Falcons shot 36 percent from the field, 25 percent (5-20) from the 3-point line, and 63 percent (10-16) at the free throw line. The game featured seven ties and nine lead changes. NDC was +7 (12-5) in fast break points in the contest. They were also +10 in points off turnovers (15-5.) NDC had 17 assists and just seven turnovers in this one.
Lynn was paced by 18 points from Bornelus, Peevy added 13 to go with 11 rebounds, Tommie Luke also had 13, while Gaines netted 10 to go with 10 boards. Lynn shot 42 percent as a team, 35 percent (8-23) from the 3-point line, and 73 percent (8-11) from the free throw line. They won the rebounding battle 45-33. Lynn had 16 assists and 14 turnovers in the contest.
Head Coach Mark Richmond talked about this one:
" Came up a little bit short again tonight, Richmond mentioned. "We played really hard and competed at a high level. They just got some key offensive rebounds and made some big plays in crunch time. You have ti give credit to Lynn they are a very talented team. "
NDC will not return back to the court until they host Frostburg State on January 5th. Richmond gave his thoughts on how this weekend can help his team down the road:
" These two games will help at some point later in the season. Both games could have gone either way. We've won most of these 50/50 games to this point but we were't able to do that on this trip. The more we can learn from these experiences the better off we will be later in the season."
MEC Standings:
West Liberty 5-1 (10-1)
NDC 5-1 (8-4)
Charleston 4-1 (8-2)
Fairmont State 4-2 (9-2)
Alderson Broaddus 3-3 (6-4)
Frostburg State 3-3 (5-7)
West Virginia State 2-3 (7-5)
Glenville State 2-3 (5-4)
Wheeling 2-3 (3-8)
Concord 2-4 (4-7)
Davis & Elkins 2-4 (4-7)
West Virginia Wesleyan 0-6 (1-10)
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